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Galleonosaurus was identified from five upper jawbones dug up in Victoria, southeastern Australia.

The name refers to the bone's shape - which experts says resembles the upturned hull of a sailing ship.

The fossils were encased in rocks dating back to the Cretaceous, shedding fresh light on the diversity of small, herbivorous dinosaurs that once inhabited the region.

The site on a beach just outside the town of Inverloch in southern Australia is a renowned dinosaur graveyard.

It also holds the remains of rodent-sized mammals, turtles, and possibly a species of flying reptile.

The fossils were encased in rocks dating back to the Cretaceous, shedding fresh light on the diversity of small, herbivorous dinosaurs that once inhabited the region

WHAT DO WE KNOW ABOUT GALLEONOSAURUS DORISAE?

The small dinosaur has been named Galleonosaurus dorisae, after the its 'galleon type' upturned jaws

They lived in a 'lost world' between Australia and Antarctica 125 million years ago during the Cretaceous, a period that spanned 79 million years from the end of the Jurassic to the beginning of the Paleogene.

Their habitat was a vast forested floodplain with powerful rivers that turned the valley into a lush, fertile environment.

The 'mini dinosaurs' walked on two legs and had sharp teeth that helped it graze the rich vegetation of its surroundings.

The new species belonged to a large family known as the ornithopods

It would have grown to about six foot, and weighed around 50lbs (22.7kg)

They were discovered on a site renowned as a dinosaur 'graveyard' and are the fifth small ornithopod genus unearthed in the area

Dr Herne said: 'The jaws of Galleonosaurus dorisae include young to mature individuals - the first time an age range has been identified from the jaws of an Australian dinosaur.'

It would have grown to about six foot, and weighed around 50lbs (22.7kg).

Galleonosaurus is the fifth small ornithopod genus discovered in the area.

Dr Herne said it confirms they were unusually widespread in the 'ancient rift valley that once extended between the spreading continents of Australia and Antarctica.'

They thrived on the vast forested floodplain fuelled by powerful rivers - turning the valley into a lush, fertile environment.

The new species ,Galleonosaurus dorisae, grew to roughly the same size as a wallaby, archaeologists revealed. The Diluvicursor pickeringi - a smaller ornithopod about the size of a turkey, was discovered in 2018 on the coast the west of the current site in Iverloch

WHAT ARE ORNITHOPODS?

Ornithopods were two-legged plant-eating dinosaurs.

They were the dinosaur equivalent of today's cattle and deer. Their horny beaks were used to crop vegetation which they then ground using molar-like cheek teeth.

Ornithopods flourished around 229 to 65.5 million years ago and were one of the most successful dinosaurs to ever walk the planet.

They ranged in side from 5 to 23 feet tall (1.5 to 7 metres) and may have subsequently evolved into more advanced iguanodontids and hadrosaurs who walked on all fours.

The new find shows there were at least two distinct body-types among closely related ornithopods in this part of Australia.

One was lightly built with an extraordinarily long tail, while the other, Diluvicursor, was more solidly built, with a far shorter tail, researchers found.

At the time of Galleonosaurus, sediments were shed from a 2,500 mile thousand mile long range of large, actively erupting volcanoes along the east coast.

As they were washed down the bones of dinosaurs, such as Galleonosaurus and other vertebrates, along with the logs of fallen trees, became mixed in.

Dr Herne said: 'This land has now vanished, but as 'time-travellers' we get snapshots of this remarkable world via the rocks and fossils exposed along the coast of Victoria.'

Galleonosaurus is a close relative of Diluvicursor pickeringi - a smaller ornithopod about the size of a turkey.

That was discovered by the same team last year along the Otway coast, to the west of Inverloch.

The new species has been named Galleonosaurus dorisae, after its upturned jaws that look like galleons (pictured), warships used in Spain from the 15th to the 18th centuries,

Dr Herne said: 'The jaws of Galleonosaurus and the partial skeleton of Diluvicursor were similarly buried in volcanic sediments on the floor of deep powerful rivers.

'However, Galleonosaurus is about 12 million years older than Diluvicursor, showing the evolutionary history of dinosaurs in the Australian-Antarctic rift had been lengthy.'

The jaws of Galleonosaurus were found by volunteers of the Dinosaur Dreaming project - made up of about 20 palaeontologists and volunteers.

Each day they must wait until about 9am at low tide for the rocky dig site to become accessible. They are forced to leave when the water returns.

Prior to discovery of Galleonosaurus dorisae, the only other ornithopod known from the region was Qantassaurus intrepidus, named in 1999.

But Qantassaurus had a shorter more robust snout than that of Galleonosaurus, said Dr Herne.

He said: 'We consider these two, similarly-sized dinosaurs fed on different plant types, which would have allowed them to coexist.'

The study also reveals the ornithopods from Victoria are closely related to those from Patagonia in Argentina.

Dr Herne said: 'We are steadily building a picture of terrestrial dinosaur interchange between the shifting Gondwanan continents of Australia, South America and Antarctica during the Cretaceous period.'

These are exciting times for dinosaur research, explained Dr Herne.

He added: 'Using advanced techniques, such as 3D micro-CT scanning and printing, new anatomical information is being revealed on dinosaurs such as Galleonosaurus dorisae.

'These techniques are helping us to delve deeper into the mysterious world of dinosaur ecology - what they ate, how they moved and how they coexisted - and their evolutionary relationships with dinosaurs from other continents..'